The following rundown highlights some hazards of deploying an electronic billing and payment system, such as not trying to introduce a new variable into a system just prior to launch.
Prior Planning:
Tell Your Vendor What To Do:
If you’re not clear, you may end up with either a damaged projector firing your vendor. Avid Greenfield, e-billing analyst for Doculabs, says about one-third of all organizations deploying e-billing solutions switch vendors during the rollout. He says some vendors have “proven to be pretty difficult to work with.”
Sizing Up the Job:
This will determine the level of support and infrastructure you get. “The [vendors] who are basing their revenue models on the number of transactions are not giving the level of support to their customers if the customers aren’t seeing decent adoption rates,” says Greenfield. “The customers then aren’t willing to go out and market these solutions because they’re not bulletproof, so you get a downward spiral.”
Testing, Testing
Testing is key. Avon ran into trouble by trying to include a new, untested version of presentment software, just prior to rollout.